


Deeply

by Zharena



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Blood, Body Horror, Cyberpunk, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Multi, Suicide, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-19
Updated: 2013-08-19
Packaged: 2017-12-23 23:54:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/932579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zharena/pseuds/Zharena
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For the first time, you're going to finally have some semblance of control over your life. </p><p>Desperately, you hope and pray that nothing will take this from you.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Deeply

System.boot();

\---

String name = getName();

int age = getAge();

System.out.println(“NAME: “ + name);

Systen.out.println(“AGE: “ + age);

\---

OUTPUT ON SCREEN:

NAME: Karkat Vantas

AGE: 18

\---

You liked the heat, even though you always wore heavy black sweaters in it. But not now, not anymore. Now, it’s mind-numbingly cold (if your brain was even capable of becoming numb anymore, you had no idea) and you can’t feel possibly more comfortable than you do now. Then again, if it weren’t so cloudy, you wouldn’t be out here at this very moment.

It’s hard to believe you’ve learned so much about your new state of being in less than two days.

Two days of wandering aimlessly around this city, ducking in and out of alleyways, hiding from the people that know you. Two days of seeing dead bodies out on the sidewalks late at night, some shot, some frozen, but most just passed out, probably succumbing to the hypovitaeic shock that had only recently begun to plague the city (though the officials didn’t realize it yet, and if they found out who was causing it, they’d probably sweep it under the rug anyway; Sector Five dwellers didn’t matter much to any of _them_ anyway); the very same thing that had killed you. And now you would have to inflict that same fate on the other people around you, by drinking the liquid that keeps their bodies (and cybernetic parts) running. You don’t know how much longer you have left to do _it_ , but after two days of wandering around dizzily, eyes threatening to roll to the back of your head every other second, your knees and fingers twitching wildly as you struggle to take your next steps, you figure you don’t have much time left.

You bring your knees to your face, not giving a shit about the old lady yelling at you for putting your shoes on the train seat’s ( _What happened to manners_ , she asks, but you simply bury your face further into your knees).  Her eyes stare down at you, taking in your dirty hair and face, the tattered bottoms of your too-loose-for-your-frame-jeans, the oversized body of your coat, and you hear her mutter something about Sector Five dwellers being on such a nice train (and while you don’t _see_ it, you can picture her scowl in your mind). Her footsteps wither away along the cool metal of the hovering train’s aisle, and you look down through the glass (at least you think it’s glass, whatever it is, it’s not unsafe; anything made by the Zahhak company is designed for Enjoyment, Health, and Safety [ _can’t forget the fucking trademark symbol either_ ] but then again that slogan is just a load of shit anyway but you can’t tell anyone that). You can see the Current hundreds of floors below, the seemingly endless blue and red flow of energy powering the city. Kind of hard on the eyes.

The footsteps return, along with the conductor of the train. God, you want to kill this woman. Or maybe not, since you’re pretty sure that she doesn’t even deserve any form of after life, even a hellish one like yours. You have a right to sit wherever the hell you want to, anyway.

Conductor’s nice. He tells you politely to take your feet off the seat (you weren’t even taking up the seat next to you, but you put your feet down anyway since, yeah, it was a little rude). After the woman leaves, he tells you not to worry about anything, that she told him that you were disrupting the peace and that you do indeed just have as much of a right to sit on the train as the members of Sector Two (One being the highest, reserved only for government officials, but the head of Zahhak managed to wriggle his way into it as well), their bodies stuffed with so much money that they probably couldn’t tell their own heads from their assholes.

The man leaves and you just stay there, head leaning against the windowless wall of the train, tired eyes staring down through the glass again. You rest your hands on your lap, absentmindedly clasping them together and running your thumbs nervously against each other; you pretend that everything is normal again, that you don’t have this hunger eating away at your mind (or maybe thirst is more the word), begging for you to hold the closest thing to you down and suck the vitae out of it, but it’s futile.

You close your eyes, hoping you won’t wake up.

\---

Well, much to your chagrin, you wake up hours later, wondering how you haven’t been kicked off the train. It’s far more crowded than before and someone’s sitting next to you, listening to music through (Zahhak) earphones, sunglasses on even though by now it’s dark outside. You conclude that this guy must be a douchebag (because what other kind of person wears sunglasses when it’s dark outside?) and turn your face to your left to look out the window to avoid meeting his gaze.

Oh, right. This train doesn’t even have a window because the people in Sector Two like to have fancy glass floors under everything. Who actually wants to look at a city that stretches hundreds of feet below them anyway? Not you. Anyway, you keep trying to look away from him, but you barely get more than a few seconds before he makes a “witty” (you put special emphasis on the quotes) comment directed at you.

“Have a nice nap?” he asks. Guy’s smirking the whole time, too. Knows he’s pissing you off. You just tell him, that yes, you had a nice fucking nap, since you didn’t have to listen to his voice. That ought to drive him away.

Doesn’t matter if it fails to work though, because as far as you can tell, he’s pretty much harmless. Similar physique to you, probably not much muscle strength under the baggy leather rich-boy coat of his. Just looking to get a rise. It won’t be long until he’s out of your sight, so you just look further away.

But what he says next surprises you, and you cock your head in his direction.

“I’m a huge douche. I can tell that’s what you’re thinking. And it’s true.”

“Well, call the fucking presses,” you say. “It’ll make headlines: ‘Rich Snobby Boy Finally Owns Up To His Levels Of Ignorant Fuckwittery’. And everyone will worship you until the day you die because, look at you, you actually understand how to not be a douche unlike everyone else that lives in Sector Two!”

And in response, he just chuckles and stares at the seat in front of him.

“Maybe.”

Silence, then he speaks again.

“That’s a year 2050 you’ve got in your pocket there, right?”

You stare at him, confused, before you remember that you still have your old camera in your pocket.

“Yeah, it’s broken though.”

Of course it’s broken, the parts inside suffered damage you didn’t even want to know the details of. But it wasn’t of your own clumsy accord; no, it happened when _he_ attacked you, when _your friend_ cornered you and sunk his fangs (why had you never seen those before) into your neck, and you didn’t want to remember. But you can’t stop the phantom echoes of his voice in your ears, that never-leaving lisp marking his words of, “I’m sorry,” as they sift through your mind and you just ask yourself again, _why, why would he do that_ , and your body starts shaking again.

This guy seems to notice, and asks if you’re okay; you tell him that _yes, yes, everything’s fine_ but you know he can tell that you’re lying. He says you look like you haven’t eaten in a while (true, but it’s not what he thinks it means), that you’re cold (you _are_ but you like it that way now), and that he’ll fix your camera for you (changing the subject, yes, but he probably just wants to calm you down, right? You’re not used to anyone doing anything for you, not for a long time now). Even though you know it’s dangerous (because you’re thirsty as fuck and you need it and you don’t want to have to kill him but _you have to_ ) you still go anyway because, as much as you tell yourself you want to die, death scares you more than anything else. So you’ll give this a try. Doesn’t mean you have to enjoy it, right? But you want to live, you have life and you’ll take it and try to run with it.

Shakily, you nod your head.

\---

Guy introduces himself. _Name’s Dave Strider_ , he tells you, and he still kind of has that slight jerkish air about him but you don’t really care. You have a place to go to for now. At least you think you do. One time, you’d tried breaking into someone’s cellar to spend the night, but something was stopping you. Something that wasn’t your moral compass, like a faraway source was controlling your every action. You’re praying that it won’t stop you this time.

He tells you that he isn’t actually from Sector Two and actually lives down in Four, close to the boundary line that sets Five apart from it. To the people in Two and Three, Four and Five aren’t that different. But to those living there, they _know_. In the higher Sector live the people who are poor but haven’t quite given up the hope that they’ll ascend to where they can see the sun and the roofs of the towering buildings; in the lower, the ones who know that trying to hope for a better life is futile.

You were (still are) one of those. That’s why you can sense the slightly brighter tone of the ancient structures in Four, the care that its residents have given in up keeping their tiny dwellings. You don’t dwell long on this, because Dave is still talking, telling you that he’s an investigative journalist trying to reveal the inner, corrupt workings of the Zahhak company. That’s why he knows so much about cameras, you surmise.

It isn’t long before you arrive at his door, where he fumbles for a moment with his keys, trying to laugh off his clumsiness. Though you haven’t known him for long, you can already tell he’s not as cool as he appears to be; you wonder why he does that, though. There must be a reason for the mask.

Then again, it won’t matter. Why are you thinking about this so much? He’ll be dead soon, right? No one will ever need to know his story, much like nobody ever knew yours. But then he’ll be in the same state as you are, and he’ll probably be just as angry as you are now.

You don’t know if you can do this, so you shake your hesitation away once again, chanting mentally that _you can do this, you can do this Karkat, it’s okay, you’re just hungry or thirsty or whatever it is, it’ll be okay once you get some vitae in you._

Quickly, you start to enter his home, before you step back with an uncertainty. You make eye contact with him once again and ask,

“Is it okay for me to come in?”

\---

Scanner response = new Scanner (System.in);

\---

And he replies, “Of course.”

\---

String answer = response.next();

boolean personResponse(answer);

if (personResponse == true) {

     enterHouse();

}

\---

Before you know it, you’re relaxing on his couch as he fixes you a warm drink and some food. You know you can still eat and drink like any normal person (otherwise you wouldn’t be able to masquerade as one of the living so easily), though you have to be careful with the hot stuff. He hands you a cup of cider, and you sheepishly sip at it, being careful not to ingest too much at once. Some heat, you can handle, but too much and whatever causes your condition will break down (not only that, but it’ll probably be really fucking uncomfortable to die that way and you’d rather starve than kill yourself out of your own foolishness).

Everything in Dave’s apartment is Zahhak branded, and only half of it works the way it should. Not surprising considering that company likes to make things that break down all the time, but they’re the only group anyone buys from anymore since they make everything that you could possibly need. But you noticed that every time Dave fiddles with an appliance, there’s a scowl on his face.

He tells you that you can stay the night, and he’ll work on your camera in the morning. Doesn’t want you heading home too late, not in this weather. You’re thankful because you have a place to stay (and you won’t have to worry about leaving right away), but you’re not calm and it shows.

Luckily, he ignores it and gets up, fixes something for himself to eat. It’s eerily quiet in the room, so you clear your throat and try to start a conversation. You ask how old he is. _Nineteen_ , he answers. You ask if he’s lived alone for most of his life, and he says no. You ask if he’s lived _here_ all his life, and he says no once more.

You’re deliberately asking questions that aren’t too personal, but you can tell that he’s afraid to sacrifice even these precious answers to you, and there’s something about the way he’s staring back at you through his glasses that tells you that he doesn’t totally trust you, that he’s not used to giving up all of this information to a complete stranger. And granted, most people aren’t. But the way he’s so hesitant to answer your questions is unnerving, so you carefully ignore your thirst for just a bit longer, and think to prod instead at him and his history (because you’re curious as hell and fuck your instincts because your inquisitiveness is taking over for a little while).

Of course, you don’t get this chance; at least, not right away. Once he’s finished making some food for the both of you, he sits down and starts to fiddle with your camera, taking the pieces out one by one. You watch him intently, focusing on the way his thin, nimble fingers slide the parts in and out, snap some back into place, twist wires around. Often, he has to get up and dig out a tool or a spare part, but he hurries back every time. _What the hell did you do to this thing?_ he asks. When you don’t answer right away, he puts the camera back down on the table, looks at you; right away, you shut down, refusing to tell him.

“I know you have questions to ask me, too. I guess we’ve both got things to hide.”

“Everyone does, Dave.”

“You know what I mean.”

“No…no, I don’t.”

You do.

 “You’re lying.”

You know what he’s saying, but that doesn’t mean he’ll understand.

Even then, you just want someone to know how much you’re suffering right now, even if it means putting yourself in danger. Fuck logic, your head’s spinning right now; before you realize it, you’re practically screaming.

“I can’t, Dave! I can’t tell you what the hell’s happened to me because I can’t make heads or tails of what’s going on with me right now! No one can find out because if they did, I’d be fucking _dead_.”

No, you’re such an idiot, now you’ll _have_ to kill him because he’ll start asking questions and nobody can find out, not before you find your answers. Besides, it’ll be okay, everything will be fine because you won’t be thirsty any more, right? _Right?_

But instead of asking any further, he simply remains quiet; it’s like he’s staring past you, trying to figure out what to tell you. By the time that thought’s crossed your mind, however, he’s already started speaking again.

“Karkat, is it a lot for me to ask you to go along with what I’m about to tell you?”

“Depends on what it is.”

“I’m not open with anyone about anything, but that’s mainly because I can’t place myself in their position, you know? I think I know what you’re feeling right now.”

You shake your head.

“There’s no way you can, Dave.”

 “Karkat, please. I’m going to tell you what you _want_ to know. Just give me a chance to do that.”

You bite your lip. What he’s telling you is so uncharacteristic of the person you’d met just a few hours before. But there _is_ something that’s not normal about Dave, something that, though it might not be as strange as what you’ve been cursed with, isn’t right.

And you _do_ want to know, so you figure, _What the hell, I have nothing to lose,_ and agree.

\---

boolean trust;

if (relationValue > 50) {

trust == true;

}

initiateTrust(trust);

\---

The two of you sit back down on the couch. Dave pauses and looks past you, trying to figure out how to condense the story he’s trying to tell you into words. A few moments pass before he finally clears his throat and begins.

He tells you that him and his “bro” (at first, he chuckles, mentioning that they were actually father and son but acted like brothers, then hangs his head for a moment) lived near the border between Sector Two and Three up until Dave was fourteen. Life was relatively comfortable for them. Sounds like the beginning of any tragic tale, really.

His bro had started up his own company, or tried to, and he was quickly gaining money. Was kind of illegal, considering how no one was allowed to challenge the one and only. Well, not illegal, just not recommended – any competition was swiftly taken care of. But Bro had been smart; he’d spread it out across a few branches so that Zahhak and his minions wouldn’t find it, leading a splintered  underground operation of one form of service or another that Zahhak didn’t provide (Dave won’t mention what service it is).

But eventually, he’d found out.

Dave’s breathing hitches and he stops talking, digging his nails into the fabric of the couch and _god damn it you can’t watch him fall apart like this_ and before you know it you’re sliding your hand over his and telling him that it’s okay, that he doesn’t have to tell you everything. But he shakes his head furiously and tells you that he needs to tell you, that someone _needs_ to know. Tears start to fall, but he continues talking.

“It was in April, on his day off. He’d decided to lie around all day, and he’d told me that we’d go out to dinner that night. I was…” he says. It’s as if he’s struggling to find the right emotion to convey, before smiling. It almost feels hollow, but not quite. Like he feels it somewhere in him, but he can’t bring it to the surface. “I was happy, since he was always so busy. It’d been so long since we’d done anything together, and even longer since we’d gone out to eat anywhere. I’d walked home from school that day excited.

“I couldn’t tell if it was because it was way too warm or I’d just forgotten something that morning, but something just didn’t feel right. The entire time I was walking, I could feel someone, something watching over me, following me around. I figured I was just tired or something, that I’d take a nap when I’d get home.

“When I got to the door, it was already open. I told myself, ‘Nothing’s wrong, everything’s fine, he just didn’t close the door,’ even though I knew that it couldn’t be true. I stepped inside, and I was overwhelmed by this smell. I screamed for Bro, but he wouldn’t answer. I panicked and ran to find him.

“That’s when I found him on the couch, still shirtless and in the same spot he’d been in that morning. He was…there was so much vitae, Karkat. So goddamn much. I don’t remember a lot past that, except for one thing.”

“What was it?” you whisper.

“I remember something grabbing me from behind; these huge strong things. One covered my eyes, another covered my mouth, but then I felt _them_ everywhere. I struggled, but there wasn’t much I could do.  All I could feel throughout my body was pain, and my eyes stung so badly.

“And then, there was nothing. I woke up in one of Zahhak’s hospitals. No one would tell me what had happened, and when I tried to tell them, they just brushed me off.”

You sit there, trying to conjure up something, anything to say to him. But you can’t, and it hurts so fucking much because you understand how he’s _feeling_ , how he wants answers but can’t get them, how painful it is to return to the normal world after what’s happened.

“I’m angry for Bro’s death, sure, but I think, more than anything else, I want answers. Because before that day, my eyes weren’t the way they are now.”

With that, he slides his sunglasses off and looks at you with a pair of striking red eyes. They’re so absolutely wonderful, you think, but you know that there’s something wrong with them and you can’t figure out _what_ that is but it’s bothering you, almost as much as the thirst unseats you and you just want an answer because this young man that you just met a few hours ago has you more entranced than anything else that you’ve encountered in your short, pathetic life.

“They’re beautiful,” you blurt.

He smirks, but this time, it’s bitter.

“They’re fake. Mechanical. Just like what they replace our bones with when we’re born to make us perfect, like the vitae that becomes part of our blood to make those parts work. I can’t even _feel_ anymore, Karkat. Sure, I can be sort of happy, but there’s sort of a block on it. Like, it’s there, but not fully. There’s **_something_** _stopping me from doing that and I don’t even know what that is._ But nobody would understand if I told them.”

All you can think about how wrong he is because lately, you just can’t seem to care about anything anymore; your emotions are stunted and it’s hard to smile and frown. All at once, you feel sick because you don’t want to take the vitae from him. Because he’s yet to finish what he started, because he actually has something to live for (unlike you when you were alive). You’re so angry that you’re forced to take someone else’s life, you’re so infuriated with your friend (whose name you still won’t think of) for doing this to you, you’re so upset because _this isn’t you_ and you _know it_ and fuck everything you’re crying and spilling everything out to this stranger – friend; no, _more than_ friend and you don’t know what that is. Now there’s someone here that _knows_ and he’s alive, you don’t want to lose him and you whisper those very words to him and he’s so horribly confused until you start talking.

You tell him everything. You tell him that you’ve lived in Sector Five your whole life with only a few friends to really help you out; you tell him how they disappeared over the years until you were left with only one. You tell him how that same friend got you a job at a coding firm (working under the Zahhak company, of course) and smile as you remember how badly you _sucked_ at it. And then you start crying again when you say that the same friend was the one to dig his fangs into your neck and turn you into what you are now and how your kind is the group responsible for the pandemic hypovitaeic shock echoing through the city. You slide your sweater off your neck and show him the marks from when you were bitten; you slide your fingers along _his_ neck and tell him how you don’t want to kill him but you’ve only been undead for two days and you’re so thirsty and you don’t want to die and he just pulls you close to his chest and holds you tightly, waiting for you to calm down, telling you you’ll be all right.

He shouldn’t be holding you this close; he knows that you could attack him at any moment. But he’s risking it anyway; you know that he trusts you.

But for a second, you break his trust because his neck feels _oh-so-good_ against your skin even though it’s warm and you like the cold so much _now_ and you’re sothirsty _now_ ; you grip his wrists and completely _lose control_ and you push him down onto the floor and pin him against it with your knees, holding his wrists above his head. And you look into his eyes and _smile_ and bare your fangs because this is it, your suffering will be over in just a few moments. You can’t help yourself anymore and your body’s acting by itself and you’re just so tired of _this_ and at least you can relax soon.

And then you see Dave again and you see how wide and _scared_ those eyes are, how far open his mouth is in shock and _fuck your instincts you can’t do this_ and you slide off him but something’s weird. You can’t feel anything, you feel a bit remorseful, sure, but you can sense that a part of you is missing, the part that would simply slip into despair at the sight of his face. You can sense it in him, too.

Of course, you don’t have much time to talk before he’s the one on top of you (you’ve never been a strong person anyway and most people could overpower you), holding you down. You close your eyes because you know he’s going to kill you and you’re both about to lose the only other person who understands you because you couldn’t ignore _it_ any longer and it hurts so much and you just want it all to be over.

But he doesn’t kill you or even _try_ to hurt you. He simply waits until you open your eyes before he speaks to you.

“You want answers, too, don’t you?”

You can barely mutter more than _Huh?_ in response.

“For why you’re the way you are. Why your friend did that to you.”

You swallow the ever-rising lump in your throat and nod.

“And I want to know what they did to me.”

“Yeah.”

“Would you want to work together?”

“Of course, but why?” you ask. “I almost tried to kill you.”

“And you didn’t. If you really wanted to hurt me, you would have done it without hesitation, wouldn’t you? Because it’s an instinct. Because _what you just did shows me that you can control it_. So I think I can trust you.”

He pauses, unbuttoning the first few buttons on his shirt, moving the collar out of the way and bending forward before continuing.

“But you need to trust yourself before you do anything. So take some from me. It’ll be all right, I promise. Those people didn’t die right away, right?”

“No.”

“Then it’ll be okay, Karkat, just believe me for right now. Please.”

Your heart is pounding in your chest (or it would be if you were still alive) and he lets your hands go. You’re trembling, but you wrap your arms around his neck and pull him close to you and you sink your fangs into his skin. You feel his legs collapse next to you, hear him grunt when your fangs pierce him but he tells you he’s fine, so you drink. The liquid tastes so good against your tongue; it’s sticky and sweet and thick and you’ve never felt so alive and you’re scared as fuck but it’s okay because you’re going to live another day.

Before long, Dave’s tugging on your sweater sleeves and you stop and look at him, running your fingers through his hair because he’s exhausted. You almost start crying again because you think you’ve killed him. Relief crosses your face when he tells you that he’s just sleepy, that maybe you took a little too much, but he’s all right; he kisses your forehead and tells you how proud he is of you and smiles and this time it feels _genuine_.

He’s pale the next day (understandable considering the amount you took) and still tired, so you make him rest and whip up something for him (to the best of your knowledge; apparently neither of you know how to cook, so you opt to stick some stuff into the microwave) while he messes around with the camera some more. You open up a cabinet, only to be greeted by a wave of cookware washing over you. Dave chides you for being clumsy while still wearing that ever-characteristic smirk of his, but there’s a softness to it now that you didn’t see yesterday.

You can tell he’s clearly amused, but you know that it can only be so much.

 After all, neither of you can really feel happy again. Whatever way you felt happiness before the two of you changed is gone, replaced by a shell. There’s no denying it, even if you don’t know _why._

But that doesn’t mean that you can’t remind each other of those things from time to time and even if it’s not entirely the same, you can at least trust each other feel somewhat more deeply than you did before.

That’s why it feels okay when the two of you slip your hands together that night even though you’ve known each other for less than a week. You run your fingers tenderly along the warmth of his and for some reason it’s not the least bit distressing and he squeezes back, smiling at you.

\---

initiateContentedness();

\---

The next few weeks turn into a routine; Dave goes out to work while you stay home (because you’ve already been declared dead, you can’t exactly find a job). It’s difficult to make progress on the case; most of the company’s files are under strict lockdown and inaccessible from the public sphere. You try to hack into their computer files using the tidbits of knowledge you gathered from _him_ about this sort of thing, but ultimately, you’re no mastermind. You’ll need someone on the inside to get you any sort of valuable information. It’s aggravating, but you have to be patient. If you work too quickly or suspiciously, it’s going to be obvious, and the last thing the two of you want is for some of his minions to show up at your doorstep.

At least in this sector, nobody knows you, so you can step outside. It’s still the middle of winter, so it’s often cloudy and the sun doesn’t bother you too much. You go on long walks, wandering in and out of alleyways (you know that’s not exactly safe), watching the people around you.

You’re amazed that there are people who are sitting there on the streets with their barely readable cardboard signs, entire families who are huddled into tiny apartments and are freezing to death, animals out in the open who look forward to when someone on the street will toss them some food. It’s the kind of hope that was missing from Five, the kind of hope and persistence that ultimately brought Dave to you.

The one thing that you had long lacked as a result of being in Sector Five. Even now, you still wonder if it’s truly there, if your feelings are a mere illusion of perseverance, if your heart’s really in it. But then you remember how hard you’ve tried, how far you’ve come in such a short time. How ultimately, you’re just trying to stay alive, be satisfied. Maybe it’s been your goal all along, even before your death, one that you’d lost sight of long ago when all you had were you and _him_ grinding away at the miserable lives you two shared down there, a routine that you’d had pretty much no control over in the first place. Maybe you’d never belonged there at all.

Maybe you’re finally at home. Maybe, finally, you’re content. Or perhaps, you’re not.

But you can’t deny that it’s seeping into your brain, this infectious spirit that ultimately separates Four from Five. It’s something that makes you happy, something that makes you think that you can live a normal life again. You can feel it when you hold hands with him, when you hover behind him while he’s on the couch and you rest your head on his shoulder, when Dave sneaks a kiss into your tangled mess of hair and all you can do is smile.

Tonight proceeds in much the same way; he slams the door shut, throws his keys onto the worn table, tells you that he hasn’t made any progress, but neither of you are worried. You tell him that it’s okay, that for now you can just relax. You both know that you want to keep going, that you want answers soon, that you really don’t have a lot of time.

But for now he sits down on the couch next to you and wraps an arm around you, draws you close; you lean into him, bringing your legs to your chest while his finger traces a circle on the side of your arm. He’s warm, but not uncomfortably so (or maybe you’ve just gotten used to the discomfort you get around it), and you ask him about his day (“ _Fine_.”) and if he has any surprises that you should know about. He responds by playfully pushing you over and crawling on top of you, hands at your hips, lightly kissing every spot on your face. When he reaches your lips, you smile, wrapping your arms and legs around him, press him closer to you (because it feels like he might disappear if you let go). He laughs, runs a hand down the inside of your thigh (the other brushes the hem of your sweatshirt), kisses you again, lowers himself a bit. You gasp.

Fingers catch along the creases of clothing, nudge clasps apart, slide smooth fabric out of the way until there’s nothing left and all you can feel is skin on skin and it’s hot but not too hot just yet. Staring at his chest, you take in the blemishes, the discolorations, the scars of so long ago, and you can’t believe that you’ve almost forgotten _this_ part of him, the very aspect that drove the two of you together in the first place. Shakily, he runs his fingers over the two holes in your neck, the perpetual bruise, and you can tell he’s thinking the same thing.

No, no, no, you can’t deal with that now, you don’t want to (make it stop, _please_ ). _Just give me this one moment,_ is all you ask as his lips trail downward, _just give me this fleeting ordinariness_.

You’re _alive_ and it’s _overwhelming._

Even when that realization hits, when you’ve finally hit that moment, it doesn’t last for long. Not when the world’s going on as usual around you, not when you still have to feed off vitae, not when the people around you have true beating hearts while all you have is this faint whirring in your chest, not when you’re _less than human_.

But it’s enough for now.

\---

In the morning, you hear a loud rapping coming from the front door. Quickly, you throw some clothes on and approach it slowly, wary of who it could be this early. Fingers slide along the cool metal of the doorknob, and you turn, gently opening the door, peering through the crack you’ve created (why did no one think to put a peephole there?).

When you see who it is, you almost collapse.

No, not him, not _now_ , you’re not ready for more of this bullshit, not when things are finally _okay_. You slam the door shut, and when he thrusts it back in your face, you throw your entire body against it and ask him what he’s doing here, (“ _Shouldn’t you be out somewhere kissing Zahhak’s ass or something in the higher sectors?”)_ and he doesn’t say anything for a moment.

 “I know you hate me right now, KK.”

Oh, is he really going to pull this hackneyed shit on you now? Does he really think that you’re going to listen to what he has to say, the one who killed you, the one who turned you into _this_?

\---

if ((RelationValue < 0) && (betrayal == true)) {

initiateAnger();

}

\---

But yet, you don’t want him to go away because he’s your only source of closure, your only feasible way of getting answers. Because he’s been one of the only things on your mind since you died, and you just want to know _why._ So you open the door and let him know that he can come in, but he stops, staring at something (or someone) behind you.

Of course, it’s just Dave, but you don’t expect him to let Sollux (there, you did it, you thought of his name) in. Not that you want to let him in, either. But you both know that you have to; if you make a scene, someone’s going to call the police on you, and then you’d both be fucked even more than you already are.

He steps in, but Dave stops him, tells him that if he causes any trouble, he’s dead.

“I’m already dead, smartass.”

“But no one said I couldn’t bury you, could they?”

 “Touché.”

They’re jabs at each other, but the situation is anything but lighthearted; Dave’s without his glasses, staring Sollux down, and he’s angry. He’s furious because Sollux is the one that did this to you and he’s the one closest to the same group, the same man that was responsible for turning your minds inside out.

“You’re wondering why I’m here, right? I won’t keep you from that. Listen, KK. Zahhak’s after the both of you. He knows that you’re trying to infiltrate, expose what’s going on. Not too hard to figure out, considering you’re bad at covering your tracks-“

“If you’re just going to sit here and tell me how terrible I am at coding-“

“Just shut up for one second! Listen, he’s going to send someone after you today, so I came to warn you.”

That’s it? That’s the whole reason he’s come to find you? Not to explain what you’ve been going through, not to give any advice, not to fucking apologize? At this rate, you’d rather he kill you, because nothing will ever be at peace. Your hands ball into fists, nails digging into your skin, teeth bared. For a moment, you forget that you’re anything but human.

 “Someone’s after us, and I should _totally_ trust the guy who told me to shut up. The same one who killed me, right? My best friend? The one who let me help him code even though he knew I was shitty at it? The person who fucking shoved me up against a wall and just said, ‘I’m sorry,’ before sinking his teeth into me? The same friend who left me alone to die knowing full well what I’d turn into, only telling me that I’d understand how he felt when I woke up? Who’s standing before me as if _nothing’s changed_? Yeah, sure, I fucking _know_ how you feel, and I’ve been in a living hell since then! And you just want me to listen to you, to accept what you say, when I’ve searched for answers since the very beginning? What kind of idiot do you take me for?”

By the end, you’re screaming, and Dave’s crushing you against his body, trying to keep you from attacking _him_ , the person that you hate the most. All you can see is you being slammed against a wall, the glass of a camera lens shattering in your sweatshirt pocket as _his_ fingers crush your shoulders and sharp teeth dig into your neck, and oh god, they’re Sollux’s and there’s nothing you can do because he’s already got you cornered and your breath is caught in your throat and you’re so fucking confused and upset and scared that you can’t scream or kick. But more than anything else, you see the delight in _his_ eyes, the eagerness that accompanies the sinking of his teeth, the feeling of finally being satisfied.

You cry because suddenly, you can see your own teeth in Dave’s neck and you’re sucking him dry, feeding until he collapses in your arms and stops breathing. It’s that moment when you realize exactly how Sollux felt that night.

When you finally calm down, all you can hear is Dave whispering to you that it’s okay, that nothing’s going to happen to you anymore; he’s brushing his fingers along your cheek, hot tears falling onto your face because he can’t bear to see you like this, telling you that he can’t handle it, (oh god, something’s wrong and he feels like his mind is about to _explode_ , he says) and you can hear him yelling at Sollux to leave. You tug on his sleeve and tell him to stop, turning to Sollux.

You tell him that, no, you don’t forgive him.

But you understand how he felt, so you’ll listen to him.

\---

Sollux sits down, slips his backpack off his shoulders, slides some files out. Tells you that _he_ probably saw how much ink he used, which files he printed, how he suddenly disappeared, so he’d be after him, too. He spreads the folders out, pointing to one; it’s thick, but there’s barely anything printed on the front of it.

 “What if I told you that all three of us were part of an experiment?”

“Considering, you know, _nobody fucking runs around drinking vitae_ , I’m not too surprised. But continue.”

“How can I explain this? You know the Current that powers the city, keeps all of our cars and trains in the air? There’s a special channel in it, if that makes sense. One that can power anything, even if it’s in a remote location. It’s kind of a side effect of it and had no real use when it was discovered.

“Zahhak found something for it, something he codenamed Project LIFE. Written into that stream is a code; It’s what powers _us_ , since our bodies can’t function on their own when we die. Whenever we bite someone, it sends these nanobots into the body’s vitaestream; they get pumped all over our bodies due to the flow of our veins. Once we’re dead, they take over. They rebuild our bones and organs, regenerate brain cells. In a sense, we’re alive again.”

He stops, hands clasped in his lap. Through his two-tone glasses, he’s staring at you, sensing your discomfort regarding that last point he made. You can tell that he agrees with you, that he’s  trying to figure out how to word the next part of his speech.

“But this isn’t some sort of afterlife where we get to keep up the same lives we once had. We look and function like everyone else, but we don’t age. Though there are some exceptions, we can’t stand the heat, sort of like how machines break down when they overheat. We can’t freely enter someone’s home. The program’s incapable of reproducing vitae, so we can’t survive on our own without stealing the lives of others. As we’ve both learned, it’s no way to live.”

Another pause. This time, though, he’s struggling, as if he’s afraid to reveal a secret so deeply embedded into his memories, a revelation so dark that he’s deeply ashamed of it. When he does reveal _it_ , you’re not surprised.

“I…was one of the people that coded the program. Did most of it, actually. Things were going well, but my team members were getting sick of someone from Sector One trumping them in everything, so they found the serum they injected our first test subject with. Zahhak had nothing against it; after all, people like me are supposed to know our places. I…tried to fight back, but I couldn’t stop them.

“You know the transformation that your body went through? Try being forced into that while fully conscious; the serum has a high dose of sedatives in it. Kills you right away. But if it hasn’t been in your body for at least a few hours, you get to feel it sifting its way through you as it heals everything.”

“And what about me?” Dave asks. Rapidly, he’s becoming impatient, trying to find the answers that _he_ still needs.

“Your tech’s kind of a beta build of what we have. It healed you and keeps your body running, much in the way our nanobots do, but it only works if you’re alive. They did it so that you’d never mess with them in the same way your Bro did; they can tailor the program to suit their needs, to control someone without them realizing. But now, Zahhak no longer has a use for your model.”

Sollux breathes, then turns his attention back to you.

 “KK, the day I bit you was the day I died. And I’m sorry that I did that to you, but I couldn’t control myself. The other subjects who curbed their thirst eventually died from starvation because they underestimated themselves. Thought they could cheat it. Barely lasted more than a couple of weeks. But you’re special, KK. You managed to control it _and_ survive. That’s why they want you dead.”

“And Dave,” he says, turning to him. “You were the first person they experimented on. They figured that there was no better way to kick an experiment off than implanting the program in the relative of an enemy. They…knew everything about your Bro the whole time. They just waited for the right moment, waited to take him down and control _you_ so that no one would rebel anymore. They programmed you so you wouldn’t do just that, but your limits allowed some natural resentment, hatred. You were never a threat until you met KK.

“Once the two of you began to talk about bringing the corporation down, they decided to get rid of you. Otherwise, the secret would be revealed. There’s no way for you to escape; if you’re captured, you’ll be studied and observed, and finally, killed, much like Dave will be. And none of us can leave, because without the Current to power us, the program will shut down.”

“Is there anything we can do, then?” Dave asks.

Sollux shakes his head.

“No. There’s nothing we can do, other than…control how we die. Go when we want to go.”

“Yeah? And how do you expect to do that?”

“That’s true, KK, but there’s one other option.”

“I’m the only one who knows how to shut down the channel that powers us. I could shut it down, end everything. After we get rid of Zahhak, that is.”

The entire time, Dave’s been clinging to you, and you’re being held to him tighter than you’ve ever been held before; the tears start falling again because you’re not ready to give this up yet, you can’t leave him, you can’t leave _this_ , even if it’s hell because you’re so scared of dying, because you’re so in love with Dave, because you’ve finally found some ounce of happiness in your life (and so has he).

But you have to do this, you know you do.

Because you don’t want anyone else to suffer like the three of you have.

\---

There’s just one more thing you need to know before it’s all over, you tell Sollux. Just one thing.

_“Why did you join him?”_

Sollux then says that there’s a little more he hasn’t _shown_ you, but he needs to take you _there_. He’s able to sneak you into the Corporation’s HQ, leading you up and down dimly lit hallways and narrow passages, ultimately making your way to the basement. In the center are two long, oval capsules, large enough to fit people. Warily, you go up to them; the tops are clear and made of glass; inside each, you can see a figure. Both are women; Wires and tubes are connected to both, but neither is breathing.

This girl died a few years prior; had been in an accident with Sollux of some sort. But she’d been buried. You’d attended her funeral on the outskirts of the city, watched the coffin lowered into the ground (she’d always said that she’d wanted an old-fashioned burial).

You didn’t know her that well; it was your friend that had known her. But the one thing you could never forget was the look of devastation on his face, how sunken his eyes were, how he’d begun to get those same circles under his eyes that you had acquired over the years.

It was an accident, but he had been the one that had killed her.

 “He told me I’d be able to see her again, how I’d be able to fix what I had done. She’d be smiling. We’d live together. You know I loved her, that I’d do anything to be with her again. So, I did this.” With this last part, he looks into the case. You can see the tears in his eyes, the regret that crosses his face when he stares at her.

“She wouldn’t be proud of you, you know.”

 “I know, I know, I know. I thought I could make it right again, anyway.”

“Me and Zahhak aren’t that much different, in that sense. He was doing the same thing; his best friend killed herself a whilebefore I became involved. Remember how one of the Leijon girls couldn’t handle society anymore, couldn’t handle the pressure of growing up? Remember how there wasn’t a funeral? Now we know why. Because we were so obsessed with challenging nature. Because we still don’t understand that eternity is a fucking curse, that we’re all meant to die in the end. As much as we try to control our lives, even now, there’s something that’s _not even natural_ keeping its grip on us. We’re being kept alive by a fucking program, one that controls everything we do. We’re not allowed to think or feel on our own because it’s all dictated by code. None of us are alive, not really.”

Dave speaks up.

“Maybe we are, maybe we aren’t. Will we ever know, though?”

You hear a voice in response, but it comes from neither you nor Dave. No, this voice is deeper; it’s that of someone who’s at least a decade older than you, someone who’s experienced almost as much trauma as the three of you combined, someone who’s _tired_ more than anything else.

“That’s correct. None of you are.”

You’re about to open your mouth when you hear a gunshot ringing through the chamber, the sound of a body falling to the ground as _that liquid_ starts to pool around your feet and you’re about to be sick, you can’t look at this. Can’t look at him, at his body, can’t think of his name but you do anyway ( _Dave, Dave, Dave, please don’t leave me)_. Not that you have long before this man’s pressing the gun to your forehead; your muscles tense, frozen, and you’re scared because you don’t want to die, but you’re so angry for what he’s done to the three of you.

“But none of you believe that, do you? Tell me, Sollux, how can someone whose mind is controlled by a program actually understand human emotions? You’ve said it, but you don’t seem to accept it!

 “When you die, those nanobots don’t simply replace your bodily functions. In order to do that, they have to dig deep into your brain because it’s no longer functioning. They have to simulate emotion for you, as well as all of your other functions. Yes, your emotions, what you’re feeling right now, are completely fabricated. None of you are in control of your bodies, and that’s final. Not only that, but I can still kill you with a bullet. So it won’t actually hurt for me to do this to you; I _promise_ , you won’t feel a thing, Karkat Vantas.”

You bite your lip, close your eyes, open your mouth to speak while choking back a sob.

“Then why? Why could I control it? How come…how come I was able to stop myself? How could I fall in love with Dave, and how could he love me back? How could Sollux regret what he’s done, even now?”

“How are you going to think of _her_ when she wakes up? Will you think she’s inhuman, like the three of us are? Tell me, Zahhak! Tell me to my **_fucking face_** that what we feel doesn’t matter, because at the end of all of this, you’re still trying to bring her back to life with a _program_. Give me an answer, because I’ve been wandering around for the last _few weeks_ without any!”

He averts his gaze, eyes on the floor, swallows, drops his gun, at a loss for words.

In this moment, you realize that you’ve always asked for too much. You’ve asked for a best friend, but he betrayed you (even if it wasn’t entirely his fault). You’ve asked for someone to take you in, for someone to help you, for someone to care about you. And he arrived, but now he’s gone and you never had more than a fleeting moment here and there to appreciate him. You loved him (still do), but you may not have actually _loved_. You’ve tried to find answers, but all you’ve found are more riddles wound deeply around this curse you’ve come to call life over the last few weeks.

He still hasn’t answered, and you realize that you’ve had enough.

All of a sudden, you’re thirsty, and you let your instincts take over as you throw yourself at Zahhak, knock the gun to the side, make him fall over. You’re tearing angrily at his flesh, fangs in fully view. His vitae tastes disgusting, and you don’t want to drink it, but _it feels so fantastic_ that it’s finally sliding past your teeth, that you’re taking the life of someone who doesn’t _deserve_ it. You claw at him and scream, profanities spewing from your mouth. But you don’t kill him; he doesn’t deserve a swift death. You’ll just watch him drift away, you think, and you crawl over to where Dave is, hold him to you for the last time, look at that _monster’s_ mangled neck, say one last thing as Sollux disappears from the chamber, his footsteps growing distant.

 “No, we can’t feel in the same way you can. Maybe, just maybe, what we feel isn’t real to you. But what I felt between me and Dave for these last few weeks…I felt far more alive than I ever had in my entire life. I…don’t think you can judge us based on terms that you don’t even stick to. Because once we became part of your experiment, you elevated us…put us on a level that was far above humans. That’s right, we don’t experience emotion the same way you do, but that’s because we’re not entirely human. We’re not even able to be judged on the same level as you because we’re so different.”

“I think you’re wrong, Zahhak. It’s too bad you’re not alive to hear me.”

It’s the shittiest speech you’ve ever made, you surmise, but you don’t care.

Because once you close your eyes, everything turns black.

\---

END OF STREAM

System.quit();

**Author's Note:**

> Oh man, has this fic been a long haul.
> 
> This originally began as a fanfic for this year's Homestuck Shipping World Cup; specifically, it was for main round 2. The prompt called for blending two genres that normally don't go together. I knew that I wanted to do something in a cyberpunk setting, but I wasn't sure what. Then, it hit me! "I'll do vampire fiction," I said, and it took off from there.
> 
> However, it quickly became apparent that the 4k word limit was far too tiny; I wrote an abridged version telling the events up until right before the time skip (aiming to write a part 2 after the round was over), but ultimately, my teammates and I decided that the story felt too much like the beginning of a much larger tale.
> 
> I've been working on this for the last few weeks, and I'm so incredibly happy to see that I've finally finished it. I'm a bit disappointed with some elements of it, but I also feel like I've learned a great deal. To date, this is the longest work I've written, and arguably, the best I've written yet. 
> 
> Despite its flaws, I'm proud to present it to the world, and I thank you dearly for taking the time to read it.


End file.
